Frances Burney

“ Little is the boast of insolence when it is analysed by the conscience! bitter is the agony of self-reproach, where misery follows hardness of heart! yet, when the first painful astonishment from her situation abated, the remorse she excited being far stronger than the pity, he gave an angry glance at Dr Lyster for betraying him into such a sight, and hastily left the room.
Delvile, who was now impatiently waiting to see Dr Lyster in the little parlour, alarmed at the sound of a new step upon the stairs, came out to enquire who had been admitted. ”

“ Is this the so happy Miss Beverley, that I thought every body born to give joy to? the Miss Beverley that seemed queen of the whole world! yet so good and so gentle, so kind to the meanest person! excusing every body's faults but her own, and telling them how they might mend, and trying to make them as good as herself!—Oh who would know her! ”

“ Great and aweful is the change she is making; what are human revolutions, how pitiful, how insignificant, compared with it!—Come, little babies, come; with gifts has she often blessed you, with wishes bless her! Come, let us kneel round her bed; let us all pray for her together; lift up your innocent hands, and for all of you I will speak."
He then made the children obey his injunctions, and having knelt himself, while Henrietta and Mary instantly did the same, "Sweet flower!" he cried, "untimely cropt in years, yet in excellence mature! early decayed in misery, yet fragrant in innocence! ”